Retailers, wholesalers, and other product distributors (which may collectively be referred to as distributors) typically maintain an inventory of various items that may be ordered by clients or customers. Similarly, manufacturers may maintain an inventory of parts and/or materials for use in manufacturing processes. This inventory may be maintained and processed at a materials handling facility which may include, but is not limited to, one or more of: warehouses, distribution centers, cross-docking facilities, order fulfillment facilities, packaging facilities, shipping facilities, or other facilities or combinations of facilities for performing one or more functions of material (inventory) handling.
The increasing scope of electronic commerce, fueled by the ubiquity of personal computers, the Internet, and the World Wide Web, has resulted in striking changes to the number of options open to customers to shop and pay for items. Virtual storefronts allow customers to view item information including features, specifications, appearance, pricing and availability from their own home or office. Such virtual storefronts have become commonplace even among wholesalers and retailers who may still maintain physical customer presences (i.e., brick-and-mortar storefronts). Additionally, many companies conduct business exclusively through virtual storefronts without maintaining any other form of customer presence, such as a physical storefront. Electronic commerce using virtual storefronts offers many advantages, such as lower cost overhead (e.g., due to lack of sales personnel, lack of physical storefronts, highly automated ordering processes, etc.), and a potential customer base limited only by the availability of communication networks.
When a customer places an order, one or several inventory items specified in the order are retrieved or “picked” from inventory and prepared for delivery to the customer. Traditionally, like items are stored together within inventory to facilitate inventory tracking and management. For example, items having a common Universal Product Code (UPC), Stock-Keeping Unit (SKU) code, International Standard Book Number (ISBN), or other designation (including proprietary designations) may be stored together within inventory. In an inventory environment that includes a large number of many different items, it may be highly inefficient for a single employee to physically locate and pick every item for a given order. For example, different items specified in a given order may be stored at mutually remote locations within the inventory facility, which would require a single picking agent to traverse a long path through the facility.
In order to make better use of inventory stocking space, it may be desirable to stock different items together in a single storage location or stocking area. While increasing the efficient use of inventory space, such co-location of different items may increase the difficulty, and thus the time, of identifying and picking a particular item. When picking items from inventory, the picking agent may generally need to examine some number of co-located items in order to determine the specific item to pick. This can be time consuming in situations where numerous similar items are stored together. Additionally, several similarly titled or described items may be stored in a single inventory area, increasing the difficulty of identifying any particular item. For instance, if several compact discs (CDs) are entitled “Greatest Hits” and stored together, a picking agent may have to read the full title for each item in turn to identify the correct item. The extra time this requires may be significant when multiplied across the large number of orders fulfilled by a typical facility. Similarly, in a facility handling items for rent or sale, there may be a large number of similar-looking items, such as Digital Versatile Discs (DVDs), stored together. A picking agent may have difficulty identifying particular DVDs from among multiple DVDs in a single inventory location. Again, any extra time required to correctly identify a DVD becomes significant, since each DVD may be stored and picked many times, as it is rented and returned.
Some materials handling facilities include a pick-to-light system, in which lights mounted on shelves or racks in inventory are programmed to light up to indicate a bin or other storage area in which items having a given product identifier are stored. Such systems may include support for put-to-light operations, as well (e.g., lighting up a container in which items should be stored). However, such systems may not be suitable for use in facilities that store different items together in a single inventory area, as they still require the agent to manually inspect the items before picking.
While embodiments are described herein by way of example for several embodiments and illustrative drawings, those skilled in the art will recognize that the embodiments are not limited to the embodiments or drawings described. It should be understood, that the drawings and detailed description thereto are not intended to limit embodiments to the particular form disclosed, but on the contrary, the intention is to cover all modifications, equivalents and alternatives falling within the spirit and scope as defined by the appended claims. The headings used herein are for organizational purposes only and are not meant to be used to limit the scope of the description or the claims. As used throughout this application, the word “may” is used in a permissive sense (i.e., meaning having the potential to), rather than the mandatory sense (i.e., meaning must). Similarly, the words “include,” “including,” and “includes” mean including, but not limited to.